Beyond the Bliss of SolitudeIsaiah 40:1-11; Mark 1:1-8Matthew 11:2-10Text:What did you go out into
the wilderness to behold?—Matthew
11:7IntroductionAs the
spotlights rise on the stage for this drama in Matthew 11, it is John the
Baptist who takes center stage while Jesus acts as narrator.As to the challenge of describing John’s
character development, there isn’t much in scripture to support a definitive
portrait of the Baptizer.By the same
token there are a few traits that seem eccentric.It is on his eccentricities that I should
like to shine the follow spot this morning.Having
dared to speak truth to power, John the Baptist subsequently found himself
shackled and languishing in a fetid and fortified prison.Later, in chapter fourteen, we learn that by
decree of Herod the tetrarch, John will be beheaded, and his head will be
presented to Salome, daughter of Herodias, Herod’s unlawful wife.Here
in Matthew 11, however, John is alive, attempting to thrive in a putrid place,
Herod’s prison.John the Baptist also
has disciples and, anxious to confirm his messianic understanding of Jesus, he
sends his disciples to Jesus with a direct inquiry: Are you he who is to come [that is, are you the Christ], or shall we look for another?Now John
the Baptist is an outlandish figure, as eccentric as any we would find in a Barnum
and Bailey’s Circus side show.Mark’s
Gospel describes him as acquainted with the wilderness, one who is clothed with
camel’s hair, wears a leather girdle around his waist, and eats locusts and
wild honey.One might even expect him to
have unruly hair and an unkempt bushy beard, resembling the appearance of a
wild man half-crazed by the senselessness of a cruel and oppressive
society.His message is equally extreme,
calling for a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. His is the voice of one crying in the
wilderness, Prepare
the way of the Lord . . .A Haven in the Wilderness When
John’s disciples receive their answer, they return to John.Jesus then addresses the crowd: What did you go out into
the wilderness to behold?A reed shaken
by the wind?To see a man clothed in
soft raiment?No. Why then did you go out? To see a
prophet?Yes, I tell you, and more than
a prophet.This is the messenger who goes
before the Christ and announces the coming of the Messiah: Prepare ye the way of the
Lord . . .The voice of one crying in the wilderness . .
.By its very definition, I suspect the
wilderness that John inhabited was a vast landscape of isolation with few if
any others dwelling there.Alone in an
immense seclusion, how delightful it must have been for one who revels in the
bliss of solitude,* who avoids the hustle and bustle of the city, who prefers
to meditate in the infinite silence of an immeasurable universe.For John, the wilderness must have been
idyllic, a habitation where there is none to place any heavy expectation on
him, no one to make demands, no one to criticize his style of speech or the way
he dresses or his disgusting diet of locusts beneath a layer of honey.Oh, for him, the bliss of solitude!That is precisely what the wilderness offers
John the Baptist.Undoubtedly
in this frantic season of Advent and Christmas, a taste of solitude could be
perfectly blissful for us as well.A few
moments to be alone, surrounded by a sweet silence devoid of others’
expectations or the clamoring of commercial concessions or the heightened
anxiety in completing our Christmas lists for loved ones, and racing with the
clock before it strikes twelve on Christmas Eve.On, the bliss of solitude!It could be the sweetest of times in the
midst of a fleeting fury.In his
infinite wisdom, God moved John beyond the bliss of solitude, placed him in the
midst of the madding crowd from Judea and Jerusalem, and designated him as the
messenger to announce the arrival of the Messiah . . . the voice of one crying
in the wilderness: Prepare ye the way of the Lord . . . Isn’t it
amazing how God uses even the strangest of characters to act out God’s plan of
salvation!As for
us?If God used this idiosyncratic,
eccentric wild man to participate in his purposeful design for all humanity,
then why would you ever think that God would not use you—with all your idiosyncrasies, your eccentricities, your
flawed character, your dubious past, your regrets about previous poor choices,
your blemished self-esteem—to further his purpose in the world?Every
week—at the conclusion of worship—we proclaim a notion that is quite to the
contrary: Christ,
who dwells in you, has something he wants to do, through you, where you
are.We could add the parentheses: Christ, who dwells in you, has something he
wants to do, through you (in
spite of your flaws, your regrets, and your misgivings), where you are.What will
it take to draw you out of the comfortable wilderness and move you beyond the
bliss of solitude to serve as a messenger of the Living Christ?A Poignant ParallelI want to paint for you with broad brush
strokes a poignant parallel to John the Baptist, who was summoned by God to
emerge from the wilderness, to move beyond the bliss of solitude, and to attend
to clamoring crowds with a promise of the coming Messiah.Here’s the parallel:In my
hometown, when I was elementary-school age, there was a man whom we called Honeysuckle.Some referred to him as the Village Idiot.Honeysuckle was an endomorph—short and squat
with a protuberant stomach—with an enormous, grotesque face and a protruding
nose that never stopped running.He carried
a large, dirty, white handkerchief to wipe his face and to shoo away children
who taunted him. Every
Saturday afternoon Honeysuckle walked to a matinee at the local Strand movie
theater. It was then that we children
taunted him, danced derisively around him, calling him names with sing-song
phrases.Every Saturday afternoon we
engaged in this routine on our way to the movies.Like most everyone in our society, I have regrets
about past thoughtlessness, but I believe none of my regrets plagues me more
than that indiscretion as a child.I
had no idea where Honeysuckle lived or what Honeysuckle’s real name was.He was to me but a walking oddity and a
convenient target for my revulsion at his grotesque physiognomy.Whether
we children acquired a conscience in the ensuing years or whether we merely
tired of the practice, we finally cease the taunting; but other younger
children took up the perfidious cause.This much I suspect, though I don’t know for sure: as one who had
suffered the slings and arrows of misbegotten, cruel children, Honeysuckle—in
his own home, protected from hurtful mocking and provocative jeering—undoubtedly
experienced the bliss of solitude.One
bright, clear autumn day that featured an azure sky, Glynnis Vandeusen,
recently engaged to be married, a middle-management executive at Key Bank on
State Street—on her lunch hour—was walking along Broadway.Inexplicably an empty school bus careened
down State Street hill and struck her with such an impact that multiple bones
in her body were fractured.It was a
freakish accident, freakish in that the bus then flipped over and remained
teetering precariously just a foot or two above her.She couldn’t move, but miraculously she was
conscious.As the crowd gathered around
the scene of the accident, she cried out for someone to reach under the bus and
hold her hand until help arrived.No one
would.She then asked if someone would
call her pastor—the Rev. Dr. Sinclair Chamberlain— to come and hold her hand
and pray. Her pastor, however, was
engage in another crisis at the church and couldn’t come to the scene of the
accident.Early the
next morning, however, her pastor visited Glynnis in the hospital, where she
lay upon her bed in a full-body cast, in which she would subsist for the next
six months. He greeted her, sat down, and took her hand—ironically, too little
too late—and then apologized for not being able to get to her due to another
crisis at the church.This was Glynnis’ response:
That’s all
right, Dr. Chamberlain, Honeysuckle came. “Honeysuckle!” he exclaimed somewhat bewildered. “Yes!Honeysuckle!” she said. “You know, Dr.
Chamberlain, I have always been terrified of Honeysuckle, and when he looked
under the bus and showed his face, I nearly screamed in horror.But he put his hand under the bus, took my
hand in his.Then he crawled under the
bus and cradled me in his arms.In that
moment, Dr. Chamberlain, his grotesque face took on the countenance of Christ;
and I was at perfect peace.’”If God
used this endomorph with a grotesque face, a protruding nose that never stopped
running, and a dirty, white handkerchief to represent the Christ, why would we
ever think that God would not use us—with
all our idiosyncrasies, our eccentricities, our flawed character, our dubious
past, our haunting regrets about previous choices and incriminating actions—to
represent his Messiah in the world?Every week—at the conclusion of worship—we proclaim a notion that is
quite to the contrary: Christ, who dwells in us, has something he wants to do, through us, (in spite of our flaws, our regrets,
our misgivings, even our cruelties), where we are.ConclusionMartin Luther contended that we should be little Christs to
our neighbors.As Christ demonstrated his kingship and power by death on the cross, so
the believer does so by giving himself or herself unconditionally to the aid of
others.We are to be little Christs to
each other, for in so doing we find our true identity as children of God.There is a Little Christ about to be born in a Bethlehem
stable, and that Christ Child will teach us how to be little Christs to each
other.g g gEpilogueAs of last Wednesday, this was where I had ended the sermon,
but on Thursday it occurred to me that the sermon was not complete without an
Epilogue.After Glynnis Vandeusen had extricated herself from her body
cast and completed her rehabilitation, she cultivated a relationship with
Honeysuckle; and every Saturday afternoon she went to the movie matinee at the
Strand Theatre.Always she walked beside
Honeysuckle and prevented children from taunting him.Every Saturday afternoon!Her fiancé Richard finally approached her.He understood that the wedding had to be
postponed due to the accident, but now, he said, this business of going to the
movies with Honeysuckle has to stop; the town is talking; and either it stops
or our engagement is off.Glynnis looked
deeply into Richard’s eyes, slipped the ring off her finger and placed it in
his hand.Two years later, Honeysuckle became deathly ill.Glynnis moved him into her house and took
care of him until the day he died.All
those days Honeysuckle lay on his deathbed, Glynnis sat beside him every night
and held his hand.Every night, Glynnis
looked deeply into his eyes and said, “Honeysuckle, in all of God’s creation,
you are the most beautiful person I have ever known.”Honeysuckle has moved beyond the bliss of solitude.He has joined his voice to the multitudes in the
heavenly choirs.His was the voice of
one crying: in the wilderness prepare the
way of the Lord.g g gNoteThe
bliss of solitude is a phrase from William
Wordsworth’s poem titled I Wandered
Lonely as a Cloud, line 22.